Professor Michel de Bouard, former inmate at Mauthausen, admits
Holocaust™ record is "rotten to the core", rife with "fantasies" and
"exaggerations"

Michel de Boüard

In 1986, Michel de
Boüard, former inmate at Mauthausen, honorary dean of the Faculty of
Letters at the University of Caen, member of the Committee for the
History of the Second World War, member of the Institut de France, said:

In
the monograph on Mauthausen that I published in Revue d’Histoire de la
[Deuxième] Guerre mondiale in 1954, I mentioned a gas chamber on two
occasions. When the time of reflection had arrived, I said to myself:
where did you arrive at the conviction that there was a gas chamber in
Mauthausen? This cannot have been during my stay in this camp, for
neither myself nor anybody else ever suspected that there was one there.
This must therefore be a piece of ‘baggage’ that I picked up after the
war; this was [an] admitted [fact] but I noticed that in my text -
although I have the habit of supporting most of my affirmations by
references-there was none referring to the gas chamber . . .
(Ouest-France, August 2-3, 1986, p. 6).

In response to The Journalist's question:

You were president of the Calvados (Normandy) Association of Deportees, and you resigned in May, 1985, why?

he said:

I
found myself torn between my conscience as a historian and the duties
it implies, and on the other hand, my membership in a group of comrades
whom I deeply love, but who refuse to recognize the necessity of dealing
with the deportation [ 1] as a historical fact in accordance with sound
historical methods. I am haunted by the thought that in 100 years or
even 50 years the historians will question themselves on the particular
aspect of the Second World War which is the concentration camp system
and what they will find out. The record is rotten to the core. On one
hand a considerable amount of fantasies, inaccuracies, obstinately
repeated (in particular concerning numbers), heterogeneous mixtures,
generalizations and, on the other hand, very close critical studies that
demonstrate the inanity of those exaggerations. I fear that those
future historians might then say that the deportation, when all is said
and done, must have been a myth There lies the danger. That haunts me.
(Ibid).

The Real Ovens

Video of Leuchter Report

AUSCHWITZ: AN EYE-WITNESS ACCOUNT
Audio interview deeper explanation

Those who thought things were good in Auschwitz

Texe Marrs The Holocaust Unmasked

For more than 30 years Robert Faurisson has been Europe’s foremost
historical revisionist scholar. Dr Faurisson was professor of modern and
contemporary French literature at the Sorbonne and at a University in
Lyon, where he specialised in the “critical appraisal of texts and
documents (literature, history, media)”. From 1979 he was forbidden, de
facto, from teaching.

After years of private research and study, Faurisson first made his
sceptical views about the “Holocaust” story known to the general public
in two pieces printed in December 1978 and January 1979 by the
influential Paris daily Le Monde. Soon afterwards Faurisson discovered
the building plans of the Auschwitz morgues, the crematoria and other
installations in the archives of the Auschwitz State Museum. He was the
first person to publicise those important documents, which had been kept
hidden since the war, and point out their significance.

Faurisson played an important role in both of the Ernst Zundel
“Holocaust trials” in Toronto, Canada (1985 and 1988). His most
noteworthy contribution to Zündel’s defence in 1988 may well have been
his securing of the participation of Fred Leuchter, an American gas
chamber specialist. He was also instrumental in arranging for Leuchter’s
on-site investigation in Poland of alleged homicidal gas chambers, and
in making public the American’s remarkable findings.

For years French government agencies and influential private bodies
have waged a concerted campaign to silence him. He has been obliged to
defend himself many times in the courts for his forthright writings and
statements. He has had to contend with numerous convictions and has
suffered at least ten physical assaults, one of which was a nearly
successful attempt at murder.

His bank account has been frozen, and legal officials have repeatedly
visited his home threatening him and his wife with seizure of their
furniture to cover damages imposed by civil judgments against his
“heretical” works. His family life has been repeatedly disrupted and
thrown into turmoil by this harassment. His health has suffered
terribly.

During an interview in December 1980 with the French radio network
Europe no. 1, Faurisson summed up the results of his research on “the
Holocaust” in a sentence of 60 French words. Here is that sentence in
English: “The alleged Hitlerite gas chambers and the alleged genocide of
the Jews form one and the same historical lie, which has permitted a
gigantic political and financial swindle whose main beneficiaries are
the State of Israel and international Zionism and whose main victims are
the German people — but not their leaders — and the Palestinian people
in their entirety.”

Somenew facts about Auschwitz are at last beginning to make a tentativeappearance. They are contained in a recent work called Die Auschwitz-Lüge:EinErlebnisbericht von Theis Christopherson (The Auschwitz Legends:An Account ofhis Experiences by Thies Christopherson, KritikVerlag/Mohrkirch, 1973).Published by the German lawyer Dr. ManfredRoeder in the periodical DeutscheBürger-Iniative, it is an eye-witnessaccount of Auschwitz by ThiesChristopherson, who was sent tothe Bunawerk plant laboratories at Auschwitz toresearch intothe production of synthetic rubber for the Kaiser WilhelmInstitute.In May 1973, not long after the appearance of this account, theveteran Jewish "Nazi-hunter" Simon Wiesenthal wrote to the FrankfurtChamber ofLawyers, demanding that the publisher and author ofthe Forward, Dr. Roeder, amember of the Chamber, should be broughtbefore its disciplinary commission.Sure enough, proceedings beganin July, but not without harsh criticism evenfrom the Press,who asked "Is Simon Wiesenthal the new Gauleiter of Germany?"(DeutscheWochenzeitung, July 27th, 1973). Christopherson's account is certainlyone of the most important documents for a re-appraisal of Auschwitz.He spentthe whole of 1944 there, during which time he visitedall of the separate campscomprising the large Auschwitz complex,including Auschwitz-Birkenau where it isalleged that wholesalemassacres of Jews took place. Christopherson, however, isin nodoubt that this is totally untrue. He writes: "I was in AuschwitzfromJanuary 1944 until December 1944. After the war I heard aboutthe mass murderswhich were supposedly perpetrated by the S.S.against the Jewish prisoners, andI was perfectly astonished.Despite all the evidence of witnesses, all thenewspaper reportsand radio broadcasts I still do not believe today in thesehorribledeeds. I have said this many times and in many places, but to nopurpose. One is never believed" (p. 16). Space forbids a detailedsummary hereof the author's experiences at Auschwitz, which includefacts about camp routineand the daily life of prisoners totallyat variance with the allegations ofpropaganda (pp. 22-7). Moreimportant are his revelations about the supposedexistence ofan extermination camp. "During the whole of my time at Auschwitz,lnever observed the slightest evidence of mass gassings. Moreover,the odour ofburning flesh that is often said to have hung overthe camp is a downrightfalsehood. In the vicinity of the maincamp (Auschwitz I) was a large farrier'sworks, from which thesmell of molten iron was naturally not pleasant" (p.33-4). Reitlingerconfirms that there were five blast furnaces and fivecollieriesat Auschwitz, which together with the Bunawerk factories comprisedAuschwitz III (ibid. p. 452). The author agrees that a crematoriumwouldcertainly have existed at Auschwitz, "since 200,000 peoplelived there, and inevery city with 200,000 inhabitants therewould be a crematorium. Naturallypeople died there -- but notonly prisoners. In fact the wife ofObersturmbannführer A. (Christopherson'ssuperior) also died there" (p. 33). Theauthor explains: "Therewere no secrets at Auschwitz. In September 1944 acommission ofthe International Red Cross came to the camp for an inspection.They were particularly interested in the camp at Birkenau, thoughwe also hadmany inspections at Raisko" (Bunawerk section, p.35). Christopherson points outthat the constant visits to Auschwitzby outsiders cannot be reconciled withallegations of mass extermination.When describing the visit of his wife to thecamp in May, he observes:"The fact that it was possible to receive visits fromour relativesat any time demonstrates the openness of the camp administration.Had Auschwitz been a great extermination camp, we would certainlynot have beenable to receive such visits" (p. 27). After thewar, Christopherson came to hearof the alleged existence of abuilding with gigantic chimneys in the vicinity ofthe main camp."This was supposed to be the crematorium. However, I must recordthe fact that when I left the camp at Auschwitz in December 1944,I had not seenthis building there" (p. 37). Does this mysteriousbuilding exist today?Apparently not; Reitlinger claims it wasdemolished and "completely burnt out infull view of the camp"in October, though Christopherson never saw this publicdemolition.Although it is said to have taken place "in full view of the camp",it was allegedly seen by only one Jewish witness, a certain Dr.Bendel, and hisis the only testimony to the occurrence (Reitlinger,ibid, p. 457). Thissituation is generally typical. When it comesdown to hard evidence, it isstrangely elusive; the building was"demolished", the document is "lost", theorder was "verbal".At Auschwitz today, visitors are shown a small furnace andherethey are told that millions of people were exterminated. The SovietStateCommission which "investigated" the camp announced on May12th, 1945, that"Using rectified coefficients . . . the technicalexpert commission hasascertained that during the time that theAuschwitz camp existed, the Germanbutchers exterminated in thiscamp not less than four million citizens ..."Reitlinger's surprisinglyfrank comment on this is perfectly adequate: "Theworld has grownmistrustful of 'rectified coefficients' and the figure of fourmillionshas become ridiculous" (ibid, p. 460). Finally, the account of Mr.Christopherson draws attention to a very curious circumstance.The onlydefendant who did not appear at the Frankfurt AuschwitzTrial in 1963 wasRichard Baer, the successor of Rudolf Hössas commandant of Auschwitz. Though inperfect health, he diedsuddenly in prison before the trial had begun, "in ahighly mysteriousway" according to the newspaper; Deutsche Wochenzeitung (July27th,1973). Baer's sudden demise before giving evidence is especiallystrange,since the Paris newspaper Rivarol recorded his insistencethat "during the wholetime in which he governed Auschwitz, henever saw any gas chambers nor believedthat such things existed,"and from this statement nothing would dissuade him.In short,the Christopherson account adds to a mounting collection of evidencedemonstrating that the giant industrial complex of Auschwitz (comprisingthirtyseparate installations and divided by the main Vienna-Cracowrailway line) wasnothing but a vast war production centre, which,while admittedly employing thecompulsory labour of detainees,was certainly not a place of "massextermination".

The Factual Appraisal of the Conditionsin

the German WartimeConcentration Camps

by the InternationalCommittee

of the RedCross

Akey role in relation to the Jewish question in Europe duringWorldWar H was played by the International Committee of the Red Cross,whichconsisted largely of relatively detached Swiss nationals,although, as might beexpected, sentiment became more criticalof Germany when the German militarydefeats continued to mountfollowing Stalingrad. At the 17th International RedCross Conferenceat Stockholm in 1947 final arrangements were made for adefinitivereport to appear the next year: Report of the InternationalCommitteeof the Red Cross on its Activities during the Second World War (3vols., Geneva, 1948). This comprehensive survey both supplementedandincorporated the findings from two previous key works: DocumentssurL'activité du CICR en faveur des civils detenus dans lescamps de concentrationen Allemagne, 1939-1945 (Geneva, 1946),and Inter Arma Caritas: the Workof the ICRC during the SecondWorld War (Geneva, 1947). The team of authors,headed by FrédéricSiordet, explained in the opening pages of the first of the1948volumes that their motto had been strict political neutrality, andserviceto all. The ICRC was contrasted with the national societiesof the Red Crosswith their primary aims of aiding their own peoples.The neutrality of the ICRCwas seen to he typified by its twoprincipal wartime leaders, Max Huber and CarlJ. Burckhardt. Thisneutral source has been selected here to conclude thetestimonyon the genocide question.

The ICRC consideredthat its greatest single wartime triumphconsisted in the successfulapplication of the 1929 Geneva military conventionto obtain accessto civilian internees in the various parts of Central andWesternEurope. The ICRC, however, was unable to obtain any access to theSovietUnion, which had failed to ratify the 1929 convention.The millions of civilianand military internees in the USSR werecut off from any international contactor supervision whatever.This was especially deplorable, since enough was knownto assertthat by far the worst conditions for internees of both types existedin the USSR.

ICRC contacts with German internmentcamps in wartime began onSeptember 23, 1939, with a visit toGermany's major PW camp for captured Polishsoldiers. The ICRC,after March, 1942, and the first reports on Germanmass-internmentpolicies directed toward the Jews, became concerned thatpreviouslysatisfactory conditions in German civilian internment camps mightbeaffected. The German Red Cross was requested to take action,but they candidlyreported to the ICRC on April 29, 1942, thatthe German Government was not beingsufficiently cooperative inproviding necessary information. The GermanGovernment took theposition that its internment policy "related to the securityofthe detaining state" (Report, vol. 1, p. 613). The ICRC didnot acceptthis position as a basis for excluding supervisoryauthority, and finally, bythe latter part of 1942, it was ableto secure important concessions fromGermany.

TheGerman Government agreed to permit the ICRC to supervisethe shipmentof food parcels to the camps for all cases which did not involveGerman nationals. The ICRC soon established contact with the commandantsandpersonnel of the camps and launched their food relief program,which functioneduntil the last chaotic days of the war in 1945.Letters of thanks for packageswere soon pouring in from Jewishinternees, and it was also possible to makeunlimited anonymousfood shipments to the camps.

As early as October2, 1944, the ICRC warned the German ForeignOffice of the impendingcollapse of the German transportation system due to theAlliedbombing campaign. The ICRC considered that starvation conditionsforpeople throughout Germany were becoming inevitable. At last,on February 1,1945, the German Government agreed to permit CanadianPW's to drive white supplytrucks to the various concentrationcamps. The ICRC set up one specialdistribution center at theBerlin Jewish Hospital and another at Basel. However,this improvisedfood system did not work well, and many of the white food truckswere destroyed by Allied aerial attacks. The ICRC role becameso important inthe last phase of the war that it was actuallythe ICRC representatives whohoisted the white flags of surrenderat Dachau and Mauthausen during the finaldays of the war.

The ICRC had special praise for the liberal conditionswhichprevailed at Theresienstadt (Terezin) up to the time oftheir last visits therein April, 1945. This large Jewish community,which had been concentrated underGerman auspices, enjoyed completeautonomy in communal life under a Jewishadministration. The JewishCouncil of Elders repeatedly informed the ICRCrepresentativesthat they were enjoying surprisingly favorable conditions whenoneconsidered that Germany was going down to defeat during a war inwhich WorldJewry had been the first to call for her destruction.

The ICRC also had special praise for the Vittel campinGerman-occupied France. This camp contained thousands of PolishJews whose onlyclaim to special consideration was that they hadreceived visas from Americanconsular authorities. They were treatedby the German authorities in everyrespect as full-fledged Americancitizens.

The ICRC had some guarded commentsto make about the situationof Hungarian Jews, many of whom weredeported. to Poland by the Germans in 1944after the German occupationof Hungary. The ICRC believed, for instance, thatthe "ardent"demonstrations of Hungarian Jews against the German occupation wereunwise.

The ICRC had special praise forthe mild regime of IonAntonescu of Rumania toward the Jews, andthey were able to give special reliefhelp to 183,000 RumanianJews until the moment of the Soviet occupation. Thisenabled theRumanian Jews to enjoy far better conditions than average Rumaniansduring the late months of the war. This aid ceased with the Sovietoccupation,and the ICRC complained bitterly that it never succeeded"in sending anythingwhatsoever to Russia" (Report, vol.2, p. 62).

It should be noted that the ICRCreceived voluminous flow ofmail from Auschwitz until the periodof the Soviet occupation. By that time manyof the internees hadbeen evacuated westward by the Germans. The efforts of theICRCto extend aid to the internees left at Auschwitz under the Sovietoccupation were futile. It was possible, however, at least toa limited extent,for ICRC representatives to supervise the evacuationof Auschwitz by way ofMoravia and Bohemia. It was also possibleto continue sending food parcels forformer Auschwitz inmatesto such places as Buchenwald and Oranienburg.

TheICRC complained bitterly that their vast relief operationsforcivilian Jewish internees in camps were hampered by the tight Alliedblockade of Fortress Europe. Most of their purchases of relieffood were made inRumania, Hungary, and Slovakia. It was alsoin the interest of the interned Jewsthat the ICRC on March 15,1944, protested against "the barbarous aerial warfareof the Allies"(Inter Arma Caritas, p. 78). The period of the 1899 and1907Hague conventions could only be considered a golden age by comparison.

It is important to note in finishing with these detailedandcomprehensive ICRC reports that none of the InternationalRed Crossrepresentatives at the camps or else where in Axis-occupiedEurope found anyevidence what ever that a deliberate policy ofextermination was being conductedby Germany against the Jews.The ICRC did emphasize that there was general chaosin Germanyduring the final months of the war at a time when most of the Jewishdoctors from the camps were being used to combat typhus on theeastern front.These doctors were far from the camp areas whenthe dreaded typhus epidemics of1945 struck (Report, vol.1, pp. 204ff.).

The ICRC worked in close cooperationthroughout the war withVatican representatives, and, like theVatican, found itself unable, after theevent, to engage in theirresponsible charges of genocide which had become theorder ofthe day.

Nothing is more striking or importantrelative to the work ofthe International Red Cross in relationto the concentration camps than thestatistics it presented onthe loss of life in the civil population during theSecond WorldWar:

Loss of German civil populationas a result of air raids andforced repatriation

2,050,000

Loss of German nationalsof other countries during the time oftheir eviction

1,000,000

Loss of victims of persecutionbecause of politics, race orreligion who died in prisons andconcentration camps between 1939 and 1945 (notincl. USSR)

300,000

Loss of civil populationof the countries of Eastern Europe,without the Soviet Union

8,100,000

Loss of civil populationof the Soviet Union

6,700,000

These figures present the appalling estimate of 17,850,000wholost their lives for reasons other than persecution, whileonly 300,000 of allpersecuted groups, many of whom were not Jews,died from all causes during the war. This figure of 300,000stands out in marked contrast withthe 5,012,000 Jews estimatedby the Jewish joint Distribution Committee to havelost theirlives during the war, mainly through extermination by NationalSocialists.

One of the most bewildered Germans after the war wasLegationCounsellor Eberhard von Thadden, who had been delegatedthe doubleresponsibility by the German Foreign Office of workingon the Jewish questionwith the ICRC and with Adolf Eichmann.In April, 1943, he discussed withEichmann the rumors circulatingabroad that Jews were being wantonlyexterminated by the Germanauthorities. Eichmann insisted that the very idea ofexterminationwas absurd. Germany needed all possible labor in a struggle forher very existence.

Thadden questioned thewisdom of the internment policy.Eichmann admitted that availabletransportation facilities were needed tofurnish both the frontsand the homeland, but he argued that it had becomenecessary toconcentrate Jew from the occupied territories in the East and inGerman camps to secure Jewish labor effectively and to avert unrestandsubversion in the occupied countries. Any of the occupiedcountries might becomea front-line area within a relatively shortperiod of time.

Eichmann insisted that thefamily camps for the Jews in theEast, along the lines of Theresienstadt,were far more acceptable to the Jewsthan the separations whichthe splitting up of families would entail. Eichmannadmitted acase to Thaden in 1944 in which a Jew was killed in Slovakia whileontransport from Hungary to Poland, but he insisted that suchan event wasextremely exceptional. He reminded Thadden againthat the Jews were solely incamps so that their working powercould be utilized and espionage could beprevented. He noted thatGermany had not employed these extreme measures in theearly yearsof the war, but only when it became evident that her very existencewas at stake. Eichmann also reminded Thadden that foreign Jewswho were beingallowed to leave Europe directly from the campswere not charging Germany withthe atrocities which were irresponsiblyrumored from abroad. In short, Thadden,who had personally madenumerous visits to the various concentration camps, wasthoroughlyconvinced that Eichmann was right and that the foreign rumors ofgenocide in circulation were incorrect.

Eberhardvon Thadden's only comment from his prison cell onJune 11, 1946,after having heard the full scope of the Nuremberg Trialpropaganda,was that, if Eichmann had lied, he would have to have been a "veryskillful" liar indeed. The world has not yet sufficiently ponderedthe questionabout who has lied and why. Yet it is a statisticalfact that, for everyfraudulent affidavit or statement claiminga death camp or a gas chamber, thereare at least twenty whichdeny the very existence of such camps and gaschambers. It isonly the published evidence which has presented alop-sidedpicture in support of the genocide myth.